EAT Meeting Minutes April 2010
EAT Meeting
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Wenatchee World Conference Room
6:30-8:30pm
In attendance:
Sandi Bammer, Mike Cochran, Tony Davis, Nadine Lehrer, Kim Lohse, Ginny O’Kelly,
Joan Qazi, Sara & Freya Rolfs, Maureen & Eileen Sheimo, and Kerry Steffan (note-taker/minutes-typer, lest you think that Joan is tooting her own horn---see below)
Upcoming:
Tuesday, May 4th—Farmhouse Table opens for the season
Thursday, May 6th – Planting party at the community garden. 4-8 p.m.
Monday, May 17th—Community Garden Education series, Natural Pest Control with Shawn Steffan, 7-8pm.
Review of EAT’s Mission Statement and Goals – by Joan
At this meeting, we reflected on the accomplishments of EAT and its partners. Here are the highlights from the past year:
The Community Food Assessment. We are still using the results of this research and our CFA has helped provide a good model for others to use (such as Kittitas County).
Calendar. Thanks to the Wenatchee Valley Medical Center sponsorship, these have been a great fund-raiser. For 2011, we hope to feature local chefs and farmers.
Northwest Farm Credit Services. Provided grant money for EAT to purchase a rototiller that is being shared by all the schools with Edible Schoolyards (it is housed in the shed at Newbery). Deadlines for future funding applications are March, June, and October.
Farm-to-School Conference. It was a great success, with representatives from schools in 5 area counties present, as well as many local growers. Several connections were made, and some local schools are now using potatoes from Cloudview Farm and local asparagus in their lunch menus. We will try to do a follow-up survey to assess successes and challenges.
Connections between EAT, CFC, and IRIS. We continue to build our relationships with these groups (and there is certainly a fair amount of overlap in their memberships).
Partnership with W.I.C. & Master Gardeners. We helped write a grant proposal to increase consumption of fresh produce among local WIC clients. We did not get the grant, but the process of working with both groups was very positive, and we hope to partner with them on future projects.
Interactive map on our website. Thanks to Ben Field!
EAT’s involvement with the Community Garden. Organizing a monthly seminar series, free to community gardeners. Spanish-speaking neighbors of the community garden are especially encouraged to attend (Nadine is present to interpret). Seminars are usually held on Mondays, around 7 pm. Ginny offered to help distribute information/fliers through her work as a dietician. Kerry suggested having a seminar about pest control. Her husband, Shawn, is an entomologist, and will be able to give a presentation.
Updated Farm-to-Table Directory. Lots of hard work, especially by Amy Simonson, to create a great local directory. Entries were based on who filled out forms at a previous Farm-to-Table conference, or through emails sent out by Amy. It will be updated again to include more local growers, retailers, and restaurants. It’s not necessarily a money-maker, but it’s great to get the info out to the public. We might be able to get a Community Farm Connection grant to do an updated version. Also, maybe CFC would be willing to take on this project since they have the connections.
Local Food Fridays. A lot of fun last summer, with great food by Tony Davis and Amy Simonson. Tony will be making pizzas this summer at Centennial Park, Fridays. There will also be live music.
New brochure. We got a revised brochure with our great pea pod logo thanks to a donated gift certificate from Rich for publishing services.
Edible Schoolyards. In March, there was a workshop for teachers on using the curriculum for the school gardens and how to connect students to our community (grow for local food bank, involve seniors from a nursing home, etc) via the gardens. We are working on the video and will try to get the map up on our website.
Booths. We had booths at several events this year, including the Chelan County Fair, the farmers’ market, Earth Days, and Taste of the Harvest.
Our Officers: Rich Colson, Treasurer; Joan, Coordinator Extraordinaire!
We will be looking to fill these roles again, so anyone interested in helping in a new and different way, let us know! We would like to reorganize the structure a bit, decreasing the workload of the coordinator, and asking people to volunteer to take on one particular project. This will spread the work out, while still having a central “point person.”
Mike and Kerry have offered to be co-Secretaries.
Also, Joan wisely suggested not taking on too many (or any?) new projects in the coming year. Rather, we should work on refining our relationships with our partners and put our best efforts into our current projects. Scrolling up, it’s plain to see that we’ve got plenty!
3rd Annual “Pea Pod” Awards: to recognize the work of our volunteers. Nadine Lehrer (plus a special addendum to Mike Cochran!) and Kerry Steffan were this year’s recipients for all their dedicated work on grant-writing, booth-staffing, school & community gardening, plus note-taking and translations!! We all deeply appreciate the efforts of all of our volunteers, thank-you!
Other business:
Maureen Sheimo works with the City of Chelan on developing sustainability standards. She is working with Manson teacher, Tim Bombaci, to get Manson schools involved with a future farm-to-school workshop. Manson Elementary has a school garden and is working on environmental education in the schools. Joan suggested contacting Tricia Kovacs, at Washington State Dept of Agriculture. The “We Can” program in Manson (Meg White) has two 2-week camps planned for this summer. EAT members agreed that we could help work on a possible Chelan Farm to School workshop in the Fall.
We discussed our presence at the Chelan County Fair. We may have a different location this year, but we are not sure if we want to have a “manned” booth. We may just have info there (map of school gardens, brochures, etc).
Community Garden – still needs money for its fencing (approx. $2,200). Sara suggested looking into a NW Farm Credit Services grant. EAT has already donated $100. Joan asked the group if we would be willing to donate more, and we all agreed. We didn’t decide on a specific amount. EAT has a plot in the garden, so come & participate.
Farmhouse Table (FHT) – Kim got a call from someone with 20-25 acres of land between East Wenatchee and Rock Island that is looking for someone to farm it, so he doesn’t lose his irrigation rights. Kim hopes to carry Scott & Ruth Parson’s breads at the shop. We discussed the Healthy Gourmet’s latest venture, the Riverwalk Inn & Artisan Bakery. See their website for details: www.riverwalkinnchelan.com.
Also at FHT – volunteers are getting lined up to help with retail this year, as well as helping with boxing CSA shares. FHT also has a student from Wenatchee Valley College who is part of a work-study program. She has already made big contributions in getting the shop ready. It will open on May 4th!
Treasurer’s Report: Current balance: 1331.12; Accts. Receivable 65.00-Wen Natural foods from Calendar sales and 22.00-Earth day calendar sales; Accts. Payable Paid $50 to join Cascade Foothills Farmland and paid $100 for fencing at the Community Garden
Action Plans for the coming year (and contact persons):
1. 2011 EAT Seasonally Calendar (Sandi Bammer)
2. Farm to School programs (Tony Davis)
3. Note-taking and Website updates/calendaring (Mike Cochran & Kerry Steffan)
4. Edible Schoolyard video (Oly Mingo)
5. Farm to Table Directory (Kim Lohse)
6. Community Garden (Nadine Lehrer)
7. Farmer Bios for WHS (?) create posters with help from WHS students